Errors of the Heart
by Phoenix17
Summary: AU. A bard tells a story of love, hate, betrayal and fidelity. Z/L.


I do not own The Slayers, Lina, Zelgadis or Amelia.  
  
Enjoy.  
  
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In a sixteenth century styled inn, a man, whose features are hidden by a cloak, sits with children sitting in a circle around him. He talks as the children and even some adults listen avidly.  
  
Bard: Gather 'round all to hear a story of love, hate, betrayal and fidelity. It all began in a land far different from ours, a long, long time ago, when swords and sorcery ruled the land, and when demons and dragons roamed the earth. This is the story of Lina, the princess of the Inverse kingdom, and Zelgadis, the prince of the Greywords Empire. Both kingdoms were mortal enemies, and their members taught to kill each other on site, but both Lina and Zelgadis had a way of doing things all of their own.  
  
Bard: It was a bright early afternoon when they met…  
  
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A young woman, of perhaps eighteen years of age, is walking down a dirt path through a forest. She has long flaming red hair, kept out of her face by a black headband, and eyes of rubies. Her stature is short, but well proportioned. Well dressed in clean clothes and carrying expensive gems embroidered in her clothes, she seems to be well off, so it is of no real surprise to her when four burly men step out from seemingly nowhere.  
  
Thug #1: In a seemingly threatening voice. Hello missy, give us all your money and you might keep your life.  
  
Thug #2: In a disdained voice seeing Lina walk right by them: Hey! Are you deaf! He said, "give us all your money and you might keep your life."  
  
Lina mockingly: "Give us all your money and you might survive." Try something more original! Please, you bandits are all the same, you make big threats and yet offer almost no resistance. And another thing…  
  
Thug #3 worriedly: Umm…are you even listening to us?  
  
Lina bored: Hmm? Oh you're still here? Here's an idea! Why don't you all give me your money, and I won't have to hurt you. How's that?  
  
Thug #1 pulling angrily out his sword as the others do: Now see here!  
  
Mysterious voice politely: Excuse me, but you seem to be bothering the lady, and I simply cannot permit that.  
  
Thug #2 threateningly: Oh yeah? And what are you going to do about it…  
  
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1 Back in the inn…  
  
Bard: Needless to say, the owner of the mysterious voice was none other than Zelgadis. He had lavender hair, yes lavender, and sky-blue eyes with cat-like slit pupils. Rather tall and well built, his muscles were apparent even through his black shirt. As he proceeded to… inflict a serious amount of pain on the…evildoers, Lina watched in a mixture of intense curiouosity and fury, quite an interesting mixture.  
  
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In the forest, the three thugs are unconscious and Zelgadis is searching them for something…  
  
Lina curiously: What are you doing?  
  
Zelgadis in an annoyed tone: Searching him.  
  
Lina adopting an annoyed tone as well: Gee, what a way to state the obvious. I meant, what for?  
  
Zelgadis: Something.  
  
Lina: Not much of a talker, are you?  
  
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2 Back at the inn…  
  
Bard: Zelgadis found what he had been looking for, a gold pendant, and proceeded to walk off. Lina deciding that she wasn't going to let him get away, followed in hot pursuit. After about two hours, Zelgadis decided to voice his thoughts. Things basically went like this…  
  
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3 On the trail…  
  
Zelgadis exasperatly: WHY are you following me?  
  
Lina innocently: I'm waiting for my apology, of course.  
  
Zelgadis: Your… apology… For WHAT?  
  
Lina: For ruining my fun silly.  
  
Zelgadis: Ruining…your…fun…  
  
Lina: You have a tendency to repeat what I say don't you?  
  
Zelgadis: What do you mean your fun?  
  
Lina: I'm talking about the fight! One doesn't come around all that often, you know. Unless you go around starting them, but that behavior simply isn't fit for a lady.  
  
Zelgadis:…  
  
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4 Back at the inn…  
  
Bard: Well, Zelgadis never apologized, so Lina kept right on following him. After all, it's not like she had anything else to do… Deciding that her traveling companion was too tense, Lina basically made it her goal to annoy him, but despite this they became quite close.  
  
Child in the audience: Did they make kissy faces and get all mushy?  
  
Bard:…No. At least, not yet.  
  
Another child: When do they?  
  
Bard: Children these days, so impatient. Wait and see. Now, may I please get on with the story? Yes? Thank you. Where was I? Ah yes… You may be wondering why I said "traveling companion." Well, it's really quite simple. After a day of following Zelgadis around like a love sick puppy, Lina was finally able to get him to tell her what he was doing traveling around. Well sort of. All she could get out of him was that he had two months to get something that was stolen from his family. Had he known the consequences of his holding back of information, he might have told more, but he wasn't omniscient, so he didn't.  
  
Bard: As time passed, the two became quite close. So close that Zelgadis asked Lina for her hand in marriage, or rather she declared they'd get married. They had just fought a successful battle with…evildoers…  
  
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5 In a Forest at night, the background is ablaze with fire…  
  
Zelgadis while noting that neither he nor Lina had a scratch on them, even after fighting ten bandits: We make quite a good team, don't we?  
  
Lina delighted that she had the chance to fight: Yes! That we do. Hey! I've got an idea!  
  
Zelgadis cautiously: Oh? What might it be?  
  
Lina: Don't sound too depressed, it' not like it's a bad idea.  
  
Zelgadis: Last time you said that, we wound up in jail.  
  
Lina: Hey! I got us out, didn't I?  
  
Zelgadis: And you also destroyed half the town. So what is this "good idea?"  
  
Lina: Let's get married!  
  
Zelgadis: What?  
  
Lina: You know, that thing that guys and girls do.  
  
Zelgadis: Guys and girls who love each other.  
  
Lina: Aww…you don't love me?  
  
Zelgadis: I tolerate you.  
  
Lina: Close enough!  
  
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6 At the inn…  
  
Bard: And thus, they were wed. A rather rushed ceremony, but a beautiful one nonetheless. Time progressed, and Zelgadis's time was running out. As it turned out, he only had two days left when he arrived at the cave where his "stolen artifact" was being guarded…  
  
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7 At a non-descript cave in the middle of a forest…  
  
Lina whispering to Zelgadis: You go on inside, I'll take care of the guards out here.  
  
Zelgadis: All right, I'll meet you back here after.  
  
As Zelgadis went into the cave, a guard was coming out, but before he could even realize that there was an intruder, Zelgadis struck him with his sword in a very peculiar method.  
  
Lina to herself: That was the Astral Vine style, but that's only used by members of the Greywords Empire! I wonder how he learned it? It doesn't matter, he's entitled to his own secrets, after all, and I have my own.  
  
Turning her attention toward the fight, Lina lost herself in the feeling of destruction and lapsed into a trance-like state, only going through the movements instinctively. Therefore, she didn't realize that she had slipped into her old fighting habits, the deadly hand-to-hand style of the Dragon Slave, an ancient and traditional form of fighting among the elites of the Inverse kingdom.  
  
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In the inn…  
  
Bard: It had been a quarter of an hour before Lina started to worry about Zelgadis. Sure he's a good fighter, but even he had his weak points. After an ethical debate with herself, Lina decided to go and check on him. She had imagined many possibilities, all heart braking, but what she was not prepared for what awaited her, for it shattered her world…  
  
Bard: Once inside the cave she crept silently toward the end of it. There she saw Zelgadis, her husband, embracing another woman. Not knowing what to do she fled out of the cave without being noticed.  
  
Child in the audience: Who was the lady? Why was she hugging Zelgadis?  
  
Bard: Well, Lina hadn't gotten close enough to them to hear them, but had she and she would have heard this…  
  
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8 In the cave…  
  
Zelgadis worriedly: Amelia-Onesan, are you all right?  
  
Amelia hugging Zelgadis reassuringly: Of course I am, they wouldn't dare hurt a member of the Greywords royal family. Although, I was wondering what took you so long?  
  
Zelgadis sheepishly: I sort of got sidetracked.  
  
Amalia curiously: Side-tracked?  
  
Zelgadis: Well, I met this annoying girl, but she ended up worming her way into my heart I guess, because, well, we got married.  
  
Amelia: My, my, someone actually managed to worm her way into my baby brothers' stone cold heart?  
  
Zelgadis: That reminds me, she's waiting outside for me.  
  
Amelia: Well then, she must be getting worried. Go to her, I'll be there in a moment.  
  
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9 In the inn…  
  
Bard: With that Zelgadis left to meet his beloved, but alas, he was too late…  
  
Child in the audience: Did she kill herself?  
  
Bard: No, she did something far more tragic. She had too much pride, being the princess of one of the greatest kingdoms in the world tends to do that to you. The moment she left the cave she made up her mind. She would kill Zelgadis, for it pained her too much to watch him toy with her emotions. And so she did, with his own sword no less.  
  
Another child: Did he hate her for it?  
  
Bard: No. He even thanked her, which surprised her to no ends.  
  
Another Child: What happened to her?  
  
Bard: Well, on her way to kill Zelgadis's sister, she somehow managed to surprise her. Amelia asked her if she had seen her brother who had gone to meet up with his wife. Too stunned at the question, all Lina could do was deny it, so Amelia walked off. Some say that Lina went back to keep watch like a statue over her husbands body.  
  
Child: So she died?  
  
Bard: Everyone eventually dies, but some get a second chance. Some say that Lina is of the lucky few.  
  
Child: What do you mean?  
  
Bard: They say that she was reincarnated along with her beloved. Now if you'll excuse me, it's getting late, and I really must be going.  
  
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10 Outside the inn…  
  
Red haired girl: You never did say why you thanked me Zel-chan.  
  
Zelgadis: Because if I were to die, I would like none other than to die bye your hands, Lina.  
  
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Ummm…Review! 


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